If You Want to Lose Weight, Stop Eating These 8 “Healthy” Foods

In this world full of “low fat” and “healthy” claims to lure anxious dieters to buy, it can be confusing knowing what’s actually healthy. To help you distinguish between the good and the bad, here are 8 foods that are commonly mistaken for “health foods:”

Flavored Oatmeal:

The real rolled stuff is great, but that flavored stuff is loaded with sugar.

Wheat Bread:

The only kind of bread that is healthy is whole wheat bread. Bread that’s just “wheat” or “multi-grain” uses refined grains.

Flavored Yogurts:

Plain yogurt that’s low in sugar can be great for you, but most flavored yogurts are packed with sugar and not good for you at all.

“Low Fat” Items:

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Items like yogurt or salad dressing that claim to be “low fat” often make up for it by loading their product with extra sugar. Just take a look at the label before you get excited about the “low fat” label.

That premade or store-bought smoothie you think is so healthy may in fact have more calories than a cheeseburger! Smoothies can have as much as 650 to 1000 calories in them due to the extreme portions of fruit, vegetables, and, often times, added simple sugars and syrups.

These frozen dinners are typically loaded with sodium, and while they may be low in calories, they’re also extremely low in nutritional value.

Frozen Yogurt:

You probably think you’re being “good” when you choose frozen yogurt over ice cream, but when it comes to the calories and simple sugars in both, they’re closer than you may think. Especially once you load your frozen yogurt with toppings at the fro-yo bar, that cup of frozen yogurt is just as bad for your as ice cream (so just go for the real stuff in moderation if that’s what you’re truly craving!)

Nut Butters:

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Nuts like peanuts, walnuts and cashews are great, nutritional and filling snacks. They’ve got what we call “healthy fats,” like avocados. But when you take out some of that fat and add sugar and saturated fat, you get a nut butter that’s not good for you at all. If you want to include nut butters in your diet, stick with those that have one or two ingredients (like peanuts and salt).

What are some common foods that people think are healthy that you know are just bad news health-wise?